GLIMPSES OF GREAT BRITONS.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume 4, Issue 1216, 28 October 1882, Page 1 (Supplement)

GLIMPSES OF GREAT BRITONS.

. (CAUGHT AT WESTMINSTER,) ; LORD beaconsfield (Continued,) Since Lord Beaconsfield's death, a fact frequently asserted has been officially acknowledged, and tho whole world knows, that he was really a year older tlmn accepted records give him credit for, Born in 1804, he was five years and a week older! than Mr, Gladstone. Certainly during the: later years of his life his personal appearance' justified statistics, His indomitable spirit always brought him tq the front of tho fray,' when his presence was needed, But it was; not difficult to note'evidence of self-applica-tion of whip and spur. For an hour or two before'he had to speak, Lord Beaionsfield sat on the'front bench in the Lords with ■afms folded, legs crossed, head slightly bent down, and eyes half olosed. It was this last 'peculiarity which marked the growth of the final change, The attitude had been the 'same for a quarter of a century, Lord Beaconsfield always had a great gift of immobility.- When in the Commons he 'himself on either front bench, he had a little: habit of crossing his legs, carefully arranging the skirts of his frock-coat over thorn, folding his arm, and so sitting apparently in a; reverie; But whilst yet he was in the Commons a careful observer would note that a, pair of keen-eyes were roaming over the benches opposite, taking in every mCvement of the adversary, noting who Was in his place and who was absent, who were coming and going, and, abovo all, turning to watch the central figuro on'the other side of the table, who was never still a moment. When Lord Beaconsfield first went to the Lords he tnaintained this habit of momentary watchfulness, But later it had given place to 'a habit of actual semi-somnolency, though there was a brief return to the older manner on the occasion when Mr, Lowe took his seat in the House of Lords as Viscount Sherbrooke,, During this particular sitting Lord' Beaconsfield scarcely for a moment took his eyes off the familiar face and figure once more brought in conjunction with himself in this new sphere, The last speech Lord Beaconsfield delivered in Parliament lacked nothing in the spasmodic energy with which he in these last d&yß simulated vigor. His. voice was raised to the loudest pitch. His arms wore; nung about in liveliest windmill fashion., He, •was on his favorite theme, He did not' 'speak so long as had been his habit on thesetopics, for midnight was near at hand before be rose. Ho intervened at the close ,of a battle the conclusion of which was foregone. It would prove a somewhat humiliating triumph, since every one knew what the Lords would do, and how absolute would be the indifference with which their dictum would .be received by work-a-day politicians, Still it was a triumph, and it was noted as a curious incident of an otherwise not eventful evening, that when the figures of the diviaion were announced, Lord Beaconsfield, coming in from the lobby, made straight for the front ministerial bench, In other circumstances this would have been regarded as an , augury. He was the leader of a party that had just defeated the government. What moro natural than that ho should straightway take his place on the ministerial bench,' relegating its occupants to the cold shades of opposition? But though noble lords smiled at the incident, it was not without pathetic interest to. those to whom Lord Beaconsfield's life was precious. It was a mere freak of absence of mind. But such things do not ■take place when a statesman is in full possession of mental and physical faculties, This was the last time Lord Beaconsfield entered the House of' Lords,

51R, GLADSTONE, Mr, Gladstone, in his seventy-second year, still walks with perfect uprightness of car- . riage, and is able in a single week to bring in a budget and explain a Land Bill, Of late his attendance on the duties of the House has been a little less persistent, He frequently, as the hand of the clock approaches midnight, folds his tent like the Arab, and •as silently steals away. He has also betrayed BOme disposition to forego the greed of speech which formerly distinguished him, It was the old complaint among his colleagues in his former administration that the Premier left them scarcely anything to do in their places in the House of Commons, His boundless ■ vigor not only covered the necessities of his own post, but was at all times ready to do the ■'work of others, During the current ; session there have been occasions when Mr. Gladstone has actually delegated to a colleague the duty of replying to a question put to hitnself. Still he never shirks work, and sometimes seems to make it, He fills up odd leisure moments in the course, of a night's sitting by inditing some of his far-reaching correspondence, With a blotting-pad on his knee, he steadily writes whilst the debate is ,in progress, But if presently he comes to speak,' it will be discovered that all the time ho has had one ear open) and &at no passage of importance has escajkd him, It is only since his accident, when he stumbled and ; fell on alighting from his carriage, that he has consented to leave the House before the sitting was quite over. Last session, during the tumults with the Irish members, he remained in his place throughout, walking out for the constant divisions with which obstruction achieved its purpose.

MB, BRIGHT, . . I Near him on the Treasury bench sits Mr. | Bright, his constant companion during some of the long intervals of the dinner hour. Mr, Bright has never fallen in with the habit, found convenient with most 1 people of dining in the evening. He is thus left disengaged at an interesting hour when most of his colleagues aro otherwise occupied, and the House is almost a wilderness. He sits and listens, with what appears a marvellous gift (if attention, to the utterances, whether halting or fluent, of some of the mediocrities of tho House, to whom this particular hour is sacred. During the existence of the present Parliament Mr. Bright has returned in full measure to active political life, From time to time whilst the Jingoes were yet predominant he was moved to the utterance of some exceeding scornful.speech, 'His was the first voice to disturb the serenity of the new Parliament after it had fallen into pleaBant grooves under the skilful management of Mr, Disraeli, Onenight Mr. Bright came down, and, like the angel of old (though the similitude did not at the moment strike any one), troubled the placid waters, Mr. Disraeli complained, with something of pathos in his voice, of this unwonted intrusion, Everything had. been going on so nicely and calmly, Parliament and, the nation were wearied of the high pressure under which Mr. Gladstone's government had been conducted. With his clear insight, Mr. Disraeli had perceived what was the need of the hour, and he/ was admirably fulfilling it. The Liberal opposition, cowed by their stupendous defeat at the polls, and disorganised by the withdrawal of Mr. Gladstone from the leadership, were not in a mood to cavil, Swords were sheathed, carbines, oiled and put away. Peace and politeness reigned in the House, Upon this scene Mr. Bright, one quiet summer evening, strode, and, without a word of warning, fell upon ministers in general, and Mr. Disraeli in particular. I forget what'the, precise occasion of his'wrath was,' But I remember, as if ;it were' yeater-

day, the righteous wrath of Mr, Disraeli, and the indignant okeers from the Conservative benches when tho Premier denounced, this untimely disturbance of the peace. I , What happened then is What always hap-: pens when Mr. Bright speaks, Lord George l Bentinck made a shrewd guess when he said' .that if Mr, Bright had not been a Quaker, he; would have been a prize-fighter, Advanoing| age has not tempered his militant spirit. His' sword is perhaps not swung bo. easily and so; lightly as of yore, But it is always ready to! flash out and come down on the head of his traditional enemies.' There is no one on the: Liberal benches who comes within measurable! distance of Mr. Bright's power of aggravation, Long usage to responsibility of office 1 has mellowed Mr. Gladstone's manher, He.feols that he is leader of the House as well as leader of his party, and that members on: the opposite side; however opposed in poli-j ■tics, or whatever amount of provocation! they may give,; have a claim upon his; courtesy. Mr. Bright holds no office which ■ imposes those restrictions upon his natural'! manner. He is in charge of a duchy, but has ! few duties, He may therefore enjoy his fling when lie pleases, and henot infrequently pleases, _ 1 ' There is one little habit of speech which is pregnant with meaning to students of his manner. It is among the moat wholesome aud powerful restraints on disorderly speech in tho House of Commons that all remarks ; must be addressed to the Speaker, and that when one desires'to indicate particular per-! sons they must ba mentioned by a certain' circumlocutory and courteous phrase, ■ This 1 is a usage which Mr. Bright habitually 1 breaks through/ He turnsupon honorable; gentlemen opposite with straightforward and ! minatory "you.]' Frequently the indica-j tionis made plainer by a scornful wave of the hand, which, as plainly as gesture can, i adds the word "canaille," This manner,| not 1 less than the speech, is pardonably ag-: gravating to those addressed. .It is perhaps■ a failing inMr, Bright's'oharaoter that he is! not able to comprehend the possibility of any ! one who differs from him being otherwisethan ia-tlie wrong, This happens in all con- : troversial relations, It crops wp in those; scornful and fiery epistles which from time! to time see the light, in which the right! i' honorable gentlomnn smites with backhanded blow at some one-whose speech or writing has been brought under his notice. 1 As an example of this.kind of settling the: question, the case of Sir Charles Adderloy (now Lord Norton) will suffice for citation.! At the time when Sir Charles was President of the Board of Trade, and occupied a (for him) unfortunately prominent part in the debates on the Merchant Shipping Bill, Mr. Bright had occasion to take part in the debate, Coming across Sir Charles, who sat • attentive on the Treasury Bench, Mr, Bright,; with one of those expressive waves of thehand, dismissed him in a single sentence: "The right honorable gentleman," he said, "is a dull mau," Perhaps nothing could more precisely hit off the character, and ■mote especially the mauner, of Sir Charles! ' Adderley than this phrase, But there are not many public men who would have cared to say it to his face in the House of Commons and with this perfectly unemotional manner,, as if what was under , discussion at the moment was not a living man, but the monuI' ment in Trafalgar Square, As for the Tories, ; Mr, Bright made up his mind about them! 'years ago—a circumstance which now saves him some mental wear and tear, if it does not spare them occasional contumely. It is some pleasure to a man that his adversary should discuss him, even with fullest intent to do him despite. It at-least shows that there are people somewhere who are not quite of the opinion of his detractor, who therefore feels it necessary to convince them. Mr. Bright never discusses a Tory. He would think it as wilful waste of time as to debate tho law of gravitation. If in the course of his daily life a Tory comes across his path, he instinctively and with more or less joyousness hits him a crack on the head. But that is all.

Mr. Bright's general health is of late, perhaps particularly dating friin the general election, much improved, Ho is able to tako his full share in duty on the Treasury Bench,' will remain for late divisions, and frequently takes part in debate, He has, moreover, partially vanquished a curious terror which possessed him after the : serious illness which led to his partial retirement from public life. For some years after he came to the House he found himself attacked with a sudden faintness whenever he rose to speak. Time after time he came down to the House proposing to speak on some great question. He has sat on the bench, saying to himself, "When thia man is finished, I will rise," But when the critical moment has come, and the opening has been made for him, lie has shrunk baok. When at last, by a strong exercise of will, he has placed himself at the table, his limbs'shook, his tonguo faltered, and the once clear, full, strong stream of speech has dribbled forth in ineptitudes, This lasted only for a'few minutes, and presently the orator was in his full swing, To Some extent this failing of nervous power is still felt, But it has worn away with renewed practice, and only a slight trembling of the voice and a norvoua fingering of documents before him show that to the great orator the crowd of faces turned upon him lacks the inspiration which it once gave, and is even possessed with a momentary disturbing power,

. LORD HAETIKOTOiV. As Mr, Bright affects the lower end of the bench, he generally has for companion the Marquis of Hartington, Within the last year Lord Hartington. has made long and steady strides in publio opinion. At the outset of his Parliamentary career he was handicapped by alack of fluency and a painful shyness. He has frequently shown himself a man of undaunted courage, never fearing, under whatsoever circumstances, to tell the full truth and the precise truth. At the same time he is shy and reserved. If he had been found at the marriage feast, he would certainly have taken a seat at the lower end of the table, and would unfeignedly have regretted'to hear the invitation, "Friend, go up higher." But when the'invitation assumed the form of a command, as it did upon the temporary retirement of Mr. Gladstone from the leadership of the party, and again on the Premier's'illness at the end of last session, Lord Hartington has shown himself worthy of the place.' All his faults of speakings in his manner. The matter is uniformly excellent, and probably those who only know him as a speaker by reading reports of his speeches will marvel that men should not concede him nearly the highest rank as a Parliamentary orator. His words are well chosen, his sentences admirably constructed, his sense clear, and his argument sound. But, except on rare occasions when he is roused, he has an immobile manner, a voice that lacks the quality of clearness, and a tendency to fall into a sing-song intonation, which combine to repel his listeners. These are matters thought of and spoken of less now than they were 'six years ago. In the mean time Lord Hartington and the House of Commons have become better acquainted with each other. His lordship is a sort of man who will stand a good deal of knowing, and the more lie is known the greater becomes the admiration, He is essentially a trustworthy man, Upon him the Liberal

party in the House of Comiriona and throughout the' country rests with- untroubled thought in view of the contingency, which they , hope may long be averted, of the removal of their present leader, Lord Hartington's Liberalism partakes of the main characteristic of his being. It is steadily progressive. His convictions are anchored deep,, and are not moved by .every wind that blows. But in spite of liis prospective dukedom, his aristocratic tendency, and his vast estates, he 1 is a Liberal of strongest and most natural conviction. He is moro Liberal .to-day than he was a year ago, and though he will never •be a Radical, he will always be fiilly abreast of tho steady, resistless tide of Liberalism, with the onward movement of which goes the intelligence of tho educated Englishman, SIR WILLIAM UAKCOURT, A remarkabk contrast to Lord Hartington .is furnished in the person of Sir. William .Harcourt. Sir William has in conspicuous degree many of those qualities which Lord Hartington lacks, He is sprightly, fluent, and witty, At one time ho even eptered i the lists with Lord Beaconsfield as.a phrasemaker, and came out of the conflict by no means disgraced, He is a sort of Uhlauof party debato, except, perhaps, that he does not carry with him the terror which marked : the raids of the Uhlans in a recent war, It seems paradoxical that so habile a speaker, so keen and ready a wit, 'should do so little damage among his opponents, should rather in many cases damage his own friends. The 'explanation of this is to be found in the fact that if Lord Hartington lacks some of the lighter graces of Sir William Harcourt, tho 'Home Secretary 'is altogether deficient in 'that weight of character which Lord Hartington brings to bear upon all he under* takes, There is an impression on the mind of his audience, rightly or wrongly acquired, that Sir William Harcourt when speaking is 'thinking more of the success of his next joke: 'than of the right or wrong of the cause he is' advocating or attacking, Hewjll have his jest if others have his estate—here represented by the cause committed'to him 'to . plead. Hi's accession to the Home Offioe was Viewed not without apprehension by those* who had at heart tho stability and continued ■prosperity of the Government, As yet Sir

William Harcourt has not done anything to justify these' fears. The worst thing that can be said of him in connection with his discharge of the duties of Home Secretary is that he is too rhetorical in the answers he from time to time has to make to questions touching his department, Instead of giving to a i plain-question a simple answer, he brings down, carefully written out on foolscap, little essays full of point, in which he discusses the whole question from all possible points of view, and 'finally dismisses the questioner in some doubt' whether he has received any answer at all. The House of. Commons does not like Sir William Harcourt as it likes Lord Hartington and Sir Charles Dilke, but he often amuses it, and is scarcely less successful than Mr. Bright in breaking the calm of an evening with sudden turmoil. This said, it must be'added- that Sir William Harcourt is not a man to be too hastily dismissed from calculation in any attempt at prognostication of the future of men who sit to-day below the first place on the Treasury Bench, He is able and ambitious, and there may some day flash upon him' a clearer view of the pathway to the supreme position, to which it is no discredit that he should aspire.' Some evidence of hitherto unsuspected qualities of self-control were forthcoming early in the session, when, during 1 the absence of Mr. TTorster in Iroland, he took charge of the Arms Bill in committee, On this occasion he astonished everybody by the patience, courtesy, and admirable mixture of firmness and: concession with which he performed a difficult task,

"I threw this off in ten minutes," softly said the poet, placing a manuscript on the editorial table, ;Tne editor said that when il came to speed no long-haired poet should distanco him; and he threw it off in less than teu seconds-off the table into the waste-basket. A young lady once hinted to a gentleman that her thimble was worn out, and asked what reward she merited for her industry ? Ho sent her an answer in the shape of a thimble, on which the following lines were engraved: I send you a thimble, for Angers nimble, ■ Which I hope will fit when you try it j It will last you long, if it's hall' ns strong • As the hint which you gave nw to buy it,. •

cendant of the old kings of England, and he has been brought up under the eye of Pro- j feasor Ingleby with the view to the champion of the coming revolution, The' immediate cause of the outbreak is of course love, The Earl of Chester is enamoured of his kinswoman the Countess of Carlyon, and woos her, to her great alarm but secret delight, in the old-fashioned manly way, Ho is, however, demanded in marriage by the old Duchess of Dunstanbrough, who is too powerful to have her wishes thwarted, The custom of the country is that the old women should take the young men for husbands, it being only those tolerably well advanced in years who, owing to ".the crowded state of professions," are able to marry, As for-the men thinking of love, that is considered indelicate and opposed to all social conventions. . Upon the eve of his fate the Earl of Chester is taken charge of by Professor Ingleby, whose advanced views are not suspected by the rulers of \ England, and introduced by him to her-family circle, where, to his astonishment, lie discovers that the men still rule, and the women obey, Measures are taken secretly to prepare for the revolt, Joined by two of his companions, Algj Dunquerque and Jack Kernim, each of whom is betrothed to an elderly woman while secretly attached to a younger one, the Earl of Chester gathers together'a small force of gamekeepers and servants on his estate, who are drilled and instructed in the use of arms. Things are brought to n premature crisis by his forcibly carrying off Algy Dunquerque from the church -where he is lead to be married to a J.O. The standard of revolt is raised, amidst much fear and trembling on the part of the men, who have been so long kept in subjection that they have lost all spirit and thought of resistance. 11 Thefiestige of the ruling'sex was a factor of the very highest importance. It was established not only by law but by religion. How ask men to rebel when their eternal interests demanded submission?" -By slow degrees, however, the idea, encouraged by the younger women, spreads, that men ought to have their rights. The insurrection gathers strength, and . at length the Earl of Chester takes the field at the head of a small force, and marches south

A BOND OF DEATH. A Bohemian paper relates a story which lends itself to two or three widely different interpretations, The facts are simple enough.; 'At Neustadt on the Metteu, a's'mall town of some two thousand inhabitants, in the Teutonic and Slavonic borderlands, a party of three friends met every evening throughout the past winter in the warm " stnbe " of the best inn, The triumvirate was formed of : the judge of the district court, Franz Rychlik, Kappellmeister Bauer, and a merchant named Kohn. One evening, in a merry humour, they swore a common oath to remain united in death as well as in life, and each member of the.guild pledged himself that, if one of the brotherhood'died, he would follow him into the invisible world in a space of fourteen days, at the longest. The'landlord, who took the oath for a mere joke, wished to be made a fourth in the league, which was granted, As all the men .were under middle-, age and in sound health, they felt secure that the first death was a'long way off, A few weeks ago, however, the District Judge, Rychlik, died in his sleep from the poisonous fumes of a defective stove' in his bedroom, The three survivors were deeply grieved," but none of them regarded the oatli made under the influence of wine as anything more serious than an evening's passing jest. Twelve days later, however, the merchant Kohnwasseized with inflammation of the lungs, from a neglected cold, and in two' days he was dead, A horror laid hold upon the two survivors, and the Kappellmeister' Bauer took to his bed, 1 lay ill for seven days,-and died on the tenth day. Only one now survives of the jovial fellowship, the innkeeper, who declares that jf he can outlive the fatal date, the bond will be broken so far as it concerns himself.

A funny story is told of Belva Loekwood, the female lawyer, of Washington, A witty follow was onco her opposing counsel, and wlion ho desired to refer to the Hon. Belw was perplexed. He couldn't say ''my brother," as he did .when speaking of the lawyers who wore, trousers, Ho didn't like to say " my sister," out of respect to that expression. He sent a smile over the room by rofoiTing to Belva as ''my.sister-in-law," hut she certainly looked daggers at him.